A little background info: I work in a swanky apartment building at 81 Beacon Street. I'm the front desk/concierge person there. This means that I literally sit at a desk for 6 to 8 hours at a time, and my only job is to get up and open the door for the residents. There are only 20 residents. And they're all so inconceivably rich that they are rarely all in the building at once. They fly south for winter. And spend their weekends in this or that five star hotel in this or that country. Typically, I might come in contact with two residents per hour. Often less. The rest of the time I'm specifically instructed to do whatever I want (mainly homework and watching TV). And yet, I'm in fear of losing my job.
This is a cautionary tale.
1. Refrain from setting fires.
My first day of work I managed to set a sandwich on fire in a toaster oven, causing the entire first floor to fill up with smoke. Had the fire gone on just a few minutes longer, the alarms would have went off and the entire building would have been evacuated. And the sprinklers would have gone off. Needless to say, they took away the toaster oven.
2. Refrain from visiting pornographic sites while on the job.
At work, I frequently watch TV shows I've missed, from "illegal" sites. These types of sites often have ads and popups for bizarre fetish websites. On more than one occasion now, my boss has come behind my desk to see an enormous ad for "barely legal" girl on girl action strewn across my screen.
On second thought, this might be the only reason I've kept my job this long.
3. Do your job.
With a job description as simple as "open door when residents arrive," it might seem downright impossible to screw up. And yet. I sit about a yard from the front door, and can hear and see when people enter the building, so that door is rarely a problem. However the back door to the residence is a short sprint away. And even when I see a resident entering the building from a monitor, the distance between them and the backdoor is half that between myself and the same place.
At this point, the residents here probably think I jog in place on the job, because every time I greet them at the back, I'm out of breath. There have been times when I've tripped and fallen trying to get to the door in time. There have been times when I've been this close to making it, and nearly ran into them because I was just a second too late.
4. Do not write blog posts about your job while on the job.
My boss just walked in.
I attempted to change the screen quickly so he wouldn't know I was writing about him.
The screen I changed it to had several ads for Naughty School Girls.
My life.
